Swamp's "Galvanized" Death Metal Is Entirely Caustic (Music Video Premiere)

April 14, 2023

It’s always neat when both sides of a split share something with each other. In the case of Swamp‘s upcoming split with Slugcrust, entitled Bind, that correlating factor is simply filth. While the South Carolina-based Slugcrust deliver this filth in unrelenting bursts of grinding mayhem, Swamp stay true to their name and Jacksonville roots with murky, jangly death metal. You can practically feel the humidity and vileness: this is some ‘skeleton rising out of a bog’ shit, except that it’s done with a malicious unpredictability not dissimilar to demonic possession.

I last wrote about Swamp when covering their 2022 album Resolve to Repel, and while Swamp’s general formula of sludgy, erratic death metal remains unchanged, this split seems to have further festered and mutated the band’s sound. An undercurrent of disgust keeps agile and melodic riffs from fostering any positive sentiment; barely-decipherable rhythm guitars and exceptionally vitriolic and scratchy vocals sandblast their half of the split’s sonic palette. The music video for “Galvanized,” which we’re premiering today, is a similarly chaotic and delightful assault on the senses. Shots of the band performing pepper a semi-coherent narrative of religion, decay, sensuality, and… Jacksonville, Florida, I think. Watch below:

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